The Bozeman weekly chronicle., 1887-09-21
The Law And The StOckmen.

The outlawed condition of the stock
rangers is again emphasized by the re.
cent order for the prosecution of num-
ber Of them in Montana for occupancy
of the public domain. We are glad that
prosecutions are to be pushed, for it
seems that in no other way ran the at
tention of the country be called to the
need of throwing legal protection around
the second greatest industry west of the
Missouri. We have already pointed out
how the land laws have favored the
agriculturist, the miner and the lumber
man, while leaving the grazier to push
his interest against the law.
In the grazing country. which is en-
braced within the arid aud mountainous
belt from the Rio Gfanic to tie
Columbia, are tens of millions Of ac,es
that will be always pastoral. They bear
no timber they hide no mineral, they
offer no kindness to the plowman. They
nourished great herds Of buffalo, elk and
antelope in their natural state, and these
have been exchanged for sheep ard cat
tie. Yet the law permits these pastoral
lands to be acquired by citizens only as
timber, mineral or agricultural in their
nature, and they arc neither. True,
limited areas have been taken under the
Desert Land Act, but its restrictions are
such as to probably warrant the vacat-
ing of such patents. As these lands
conform in character to neither of the
classes recognized by law their occupants
are outlawed. They are trespassers up
on the public domain. They are guilty
of crime in substituting cattle and
sheep for buffalo and elk, though the
substitution produced food for millions,
created a great export trade in American
meats. made work for ship builders en-
ployment for sailors and stevedores, and
profits for ship-owners, and helped turn
the balance of trade in our favor.
The Federal land officers heretofore
have connived at the outlawry of this
interest by permitting its illegal tenantry
of the public domain, and so this pastoral
industry has grown in the shadow of
| Justice until enforcement of the law, as
it is means ruin to so many, as to almost
import financial panic in the country.
With the facts before it, Congress
should not hesitate to amend the land
laws so that distinctive pastoral lands
can be acquired as such in the large
tracts in which they haye been naturally
distributed.
1t is idle demagogy to deny to the
graziers the same protection which the
law extends to farmers, miners and lum-
bermen. The present Administration.
if it do nothing else deserving the
gratitude of the west, will receive sup
port, because it has demonstrated that
things cannot be permitted to go on as
they are. The law fprbids that utility
which the graziers have 80 beneficially
developed in the pastoral lands. The
Administration enforces the law. II can
not change nor soften it, That is the
duty of Congress.
If there be doubt as to the character
of pastoral lands anywhere; let the law
provide for their use unler leasehold
by the graziers. while, when their
character and the climate are intlexibly
fixed, let them pass by purchase to the
private owner. We have no doubt that
the lands in Montana, whose illegal
occupancy is about to be punished, are
incapable of any o.aer utility than the
production of cattle. The East NAV re-
, new its agonies about "homes for the
people," but we who are in contact with
these deserts and mountains know what
hopeless and idiotic rot that is. There
. are no people on earth who would try
and found homes on such lands as are
usually occupied by the graziers. 1t is
+ simply question between beef and
buffalo. The law is for the bEiialo and
against the beef The Executive has IN
enforce the law until Congress draws its
t senses together, and makes the change
required to emancipate the greatest
meat-food producing interest on the
plapat -Alto